Saturday, June 13, 2015

Pretty good piece on the current 'Leftists eating themselves' situation

The progressive crusaders driving these wars have been dubbed “social justice warriors,” or “SJWs,” by their Internet foes. Some activists on the left proudly embrace the label, crowing that it says a lot about the other side that it uses “social justice” as a derisive epithet. But in fact, this version of “social justice” is not about social justice at all. It is a cultish, essentially totalitarian ideology deeply inimical—as liberals such as Jonathan Chait warn in New York Magazine—to the traditional values of the liberal left, and not just because of the movement’s hostility to freedom of “harmful” speech.
She, like many others, misses an important thing: as Michael Williamson put it, they're leftists, there's nothing liberal about them.

Speaking of, did you know that 'Separate but Equal' is actually a good thing(long as it's the 'right people' getting the separate)?So let’s get this straight (pun intended): Instead of working to
ensure that LGBT students aren’t harassed and treated equally, the
University of Oklahoma–a public university subject to the Equal
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment–thinks it’s better to
offer a segregated “safe space” for LGBT students? Seriously?How about a taxpayer-funded “safe space” for conservatives, or
pro-life students, or even (gasp!) white men? Would the University of
Oklahoma think such spaces would be important to furthering its mission
of inclusion and diversity, too? Yeah, we know the answer. Oh well, it
will make an interesting lawsuit.

Trust? Any of them? Why?The OPM had no IT security staff until 2013, and it showed. The agency
was harshly criticized for its lax security in an inspector general’s
report released last November that cited its lack of encryption and the
agency’s failure to track its equipment. Investigators found that the
OPM failed to maintain an inventory list of all of its servers and
databases and didn’t even know all the systems that were connected to
its networks. The agency also failed to use multi-factor authentication
for workers accessing the systems remotely from home or on the road.

Lot more in the post, but this covers it very well:Here's what neither gentleman understands: We don't trust the GOP any longer.Paul Ryan argues that there's no sense blocking the fast track
authority because Congress will always get an up-or-down vote on the
actual trade deal, whenever Obama deigns to share it with us.He doesn't understand: We no longer trust the GOP. Yes, Mr. Ryan, the GOP will have another chance to weigh in on the TPP in its final form But we don't trust you to do the right thing then, just as we don't trust you to do the right thing now.

At this point, I'm thinking we need to flush EVERYONE out of the State Department and start over. This is... 'insane' and 'idiotic' don't come close. And 'massive corruption' is in there somewhere.
Patrick Kennedy, the State Department's
undersecretary for management, allegedly blocked diplomatic security
investigations that may have cast the bureau in a negative light.
According to an internal memo prepared by the inspector general in October 2013 and obtained by the Washington Examiner,
Kennedy personally called off an investigation into the ambassador to
Belgium after allegations surfaced that the ambassador had solicited
"sexual favors from both prostitutes and minor children."
...Higbie said the fact that Kennedy has
remained in his post despite years of whistleblower testimony against
him has "stripped many State Department employees of hope that Kennedy's
example will not become acceptable practice and that real cultural
change will take place."

Oh, hell, just go read it. It's amazing, and disgusting, and the fact that this bastard is still in that position tells you all you need to know about the culture in DC in general and the State Dept. in particular.

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at elmtreeforge at att point net

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their consciences. - C.S. Lewis

Y'all got on this boat for different reasons, but y'all come to the same place. So now I'm asking more of you than I have before. Maybe all. Sure as I know anything, I know this - they will try again. Maybe on another world, maybe on this very ground swept clean. A year from now, ten? They'll swing back to the belief that they can make people... better. And I do not hold to that. So no more runnin'. I aim to misbehave. - Capt. Mal

A Rifleman’s Prayer:Oh Lord, I would live my life in freedom, peace and happiness, enjoying the simple pleasures of hearth and home. I would die an old, old man in my own bed, preferably of sexual overexertion.

But if that is not to be, Lord, if monsters such as this should find their way to my little corner of the world on my watch, then help me to sweep those bastards from the ramparts, because doing that is good, and right, and just.

And if in this I should fall, let me be found atop a pile of brass, behind the wall I made of their corpses. Geek with a .45

"He's Black Council,", I said.

"Or maybe stupid," Ebenezar countered.

I thought about it. "Not sure which is scarier."

Ebenezar blinked at me, then snorted. "Stupid, Hoss. Every time. Only so many blackhearted villains in the world, and they only get uppity on occasion. Stupid's everywhere, every day." Ebenezar McCoy

“A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition” ― Rudyard Kipling

This deprecation of individual freedom was objectionable to me. I am convinced now, as I was then, that man is an end because he is a child of God. Man is not made for the state; the state is made for man. To deprive man of freedom is to relegate him to the status of a thing, rather than elevate him to the status of a person. Man must never be treated as means to the end of the state; but always as an end within himself." Dr. M.L. King Jr.